January 27th, 2010
#231 – Hurt Like the Dickens
Finally! Shoulda spent more time working through the dialog cuz it sure took a lot of time to figure out when I thought I was almost done. Hopefully it was all worth it. I gotta give thanks to superfan Tom for suggesting (a very long time ago) to make a recurring gag out of Spence messing with Cass’ mom on the phone. I did it once before back in this strip.
Unless you don’t like today’s strip, then I will gladly have Tom sacked. Jolly good.
Artist’s note: this is the first strip in a while that I didn’t clone any artwork from another panel or previous strip. I’m kinda proud of that.
1/28 – Added a color version. Much more fun and lively, much more production time. But for you guys? Anything!…or nothing, depending on the day.
January 28th, 2010 at 6:54 am
Is Cass’ mom ever going to believe Spence? Maybe you could have a strip where Cass really *is* in trouble but she won’t believe him because he cried wolf too many times? This would have to go on for awhile before you could do that, but it’s an idea for the future! Good work Mark
January 28th, 2010 at 9:06 am
Well, thank you so much Mister Funny Comic Man! Now my co-workers think I’m the crazy guy that laughs out loud at nothing! But it was worth it! This is extremely funny and will make an excellent recurring gag. Spencer has always had a good grasp of “phone” humor. Strip #2 being a prime example. Nice work, ME!
January 29th, 2010 at 9:24 am
@Kala – Could happen, never thought of that. Tom’s suggestion was that she never figure out he’s joking, but that may not fit with her personality as evidenced so far. Guess I’m still figuring her out.
@OB – Spreading the hint of insanity is just one of the many free services I offer. Glad you could make use of it.
@Tanya – sorry, I lost your comment. Apparently my English isn’t so good; when I hit “approve” to post your comment, WordPress took that as “delete with extreme prejudice”. Thanks, though – I read and enjoyed it.
btw, Tanya mentioned she figured Spence to have a novelty phone, but seeing as how Cass is appearing from a shower, one should assume it’s her place (and it is). “But, doesn’t she live with her mom?” you may be asking. Yes, she does, and I sort of forgot about that until I was arranging the dialog. So just assume Mom’s at the store and forgot what kind of peanut butter they use. And she probably used her last bit of change to make the call. Yeah. That’ll do.
January 29th, 2010 at 3:29 pm
haha awesome mickey mouse phone
i should use that cop excuse the next time someone calls … muahaha xD
January 30th, 2010 at 9:24 pm
YAY, Gilly’s back! Been a little while – you liking Texas yet?
February 1st, 2010 at 1:07 pm
LOL…good stuff. I definitely like the color version better. I think the only place the grayscale works better is in the first frame’s sound effects. The boldness gets lost a little with the gradient. Otherwise, COLOR!!!
February 1st, 2010 at 9:04 pm
Thanks! On color, I so agree, and if the print dream fizzles and this becomes solely a webcomic, that’s what it’ll be. When will Pinkerton join the technocolor union?
February 1st, 2010 at 10:38 pm
Does the production of a color strip start with making the B&W version? (I’m not familiar with this sort of stuff, and I guess it’d be a non-issue compared to the income from syndication.) Anyway, I know some newspapers do print the daily comics in color. So I vote for color, regardless.
@midnight666massacre – If someone calls me, and it’s a wrong number, and they ask for Gillybean, I’ll tell them to call the Ferndale police department.
February 2nd, 2010 at 9:04 am
Once I get the inked line work scanned in, then I have to take either the color path or the b&w path. Technically I could take the color path and simply convert it to grayscale for the b&w, but a lot of color tones are the same and would result in a mostly middle gray comic. B&W goes a lot faster because I only use 2-3 shades of gray and I don’t have to close up the open shapes on Cass & Spence’s heads since they remain white.